first recorded shortly after the premiere, with the original forces. Analysis The concerto is in three movements, but does not follow the conventional concerto form of a brisk opening movement followed by a slow movement: like Walton’s earlier concertos for viola and violin, the Cello Concerto has a moderately paced opening movement followed by a much quicker central scherzo. The concerto is scored for 2 flutes (second doubling piccolo), 2 oboes (second doubling cor anglais), 2 clarinets (second doubling bass clarinet), 2 bassoons (second doubling contrabassoon), 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, 3 percussion (vibraphone, xylophone, suspended cymbal, bass drum, castanets, snare drum), celesta, harp, strings. The three movements are: Moderato Allegro appassionato Tema ed improvvisazioni (Theme and improvisations) 1. Moderato The movement is in C major. The music critic Frank Howes has written that the concerto "starts with a splash, as of a stone dropped into a pool, a chord on the vibraphone and hard, trills on a viola and an oscillating figure on the wind and upper strings." The opening continues with an expressive cello melody over a "tick-tock" pizzicato accompaniment, which dominates the movement. Walton's biographer Michael Kennedy calls the long opening theme "comprehensive and chromatic, with ambiguously unstable tonality … a seductively amorous invention". A secondary theme, marked allegro tranquillo presents a descending pattern of semiquavers in tandem with the "tick-tock" motif, leading eventually to the return of the first theme over a woodwind accompaniment. The movement ends in what Howes calls "a prolonged diatonic cadence" in which the last bars drop through five octaves. 2. Allegro appassionato The key of the second movement is ambiguous; there is no key signature in the score, and analysts have described it as basically in C-sharp minor or A minor. The movement is described by Kennedy as "a typically Waltonian firework display". Howes comments that although it has the appearance of a scherzo, the allegro appassionato marking points to its being the emotional core of the work, as well as the most substantial and highly organised of the three movements. It differs from conventional scherzos not only by its emotional force but by the absence of a trio section. The energetic main theme twice briefly gives way to cello leads to a lyrical phrase at a slightly slower tempo, but this tempo alternates with and then gives way to the original speed. Kennedy describes the orchestral scoring